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Everyday Peace and the Other in Bosnian Mixed-Ethnicity Families

Keziah Conrad

In Bosnia, 20 years aft er a war of ethnic cleansing, mixed-ethnicity families
swim against the stream of nationalist separatism that insists all Bosnians should
be neatly sorted into ethnic categories. When asked about their experiences, however,
mixed families in Sarajevo during fieldwork from 2011 to 2012 repeatedly insisted that
they were just “ordinary,” “normal” families. In this article, I look closely at an ordinary
evening in the life of one such family, examining how they achieve this atmosphere of
everydayness within which ordinary kin relationships are sustained despite the volatility
of diff erences in ethnic and religious affi liation. Using a conversation analytic
approach and building on the work of ordinary ethics theorists, I argue that the sense
of being an ordinary family is an accomplishment constituted through active intersubjective
work.

A Neurofilmological Approach

Valerio Sbravatti

The acoustic blast is one of the most recurrent sound devices in horror
cinema. It is designed to elicit the startle response from the audience, and
thus gives them a “jump scare.” It can occur both in the form of a diegetic bang
and in the form of a nondiegetic stinger (i.e., a musical blare provided by the
score). In this article, I will advance the hypothesis that silence plays a crucial
role in contemporary horror films, both perceptually, since it leaves the sound
field free for the acoustic blast, and cognitively, since it posits the audience in
an aversive anticipatory state that makes the startle more intense. I will analyze
the acoustic startle using a neurofilmological approach, which takes into
account findings from experimental sciences in order to better understand
the relationship between physiological and psychological factors that make
such an effect possible during the filmic experience.

Reversing the world—What austerity does to time and place

Theodoros Rakopoulos

Instead of taking for granted that austerity is unidirectionally associated
with Europe, the anthropology of austerity should be paying attention to the situatedness
of its effects. The levering potential that a comparative analysis of austerity
allows is precious, for it opens new critical perspectives on our understanding
of temporal and geographical consciousness. An antipode of perspective invites
a more historical analysis of a phenomenon that unsettles the conceived understandings
of Europe’s position.

Democracy and Boundaries in the Anthropocene

Amanda Machin

The Anthropocene diagnosis, in which humanity has become a
disruptive geological force, indicates an irresolvable political paradox. The
political demos is inevitably and necessarily bounded. The Anthropocene,
however, heralds the anthropos—the globalized more-than-human identity.
The anthropos challenges the maintenance of political boundaries, yet any
robust response to ecological predicament must be underpinned by a decisive
demos. This article, informed by theories of political agonism, suggests
that this paradox importantly provokes ongoing political contestation of the
inevitable yet contingent exclusions from politics and the proper place of
political boundaries in the Anthropocene. The article concludes that the
Anthropocene diagnosis provides an opportunity for a lively democratic politics
in which the demos is always prompted to reimagine itself and asks, who
are “we” in the Anthropocene?

On Soldierly Becomings in the Desert of the Real

Thomas Randrup Pedersen

What if war is not hell? What if war is not entertainment? What if war is, instead, the
stuff dreams are made of? What is one then to anticipate of one’s tour of duty in a war
zone? In this article, I interrogate anticipations in relation to soldierly becomings
through deployment to Afghanistan. Based on ethnographic fieldwork with Danish
combat troops, I explore the uneasy coexistence of two anticipatory plotlines: ‘the
passion’ and ‘the desert’. The former depicts the tour of duty as a heroic adventure
driven by desire for real combat, while the latter casts deployment as an anti-heroic
misadventure imposed by the dull reality in theatre. I argue that anticipation can
harbour ambivalent, even antagonistic, yet simultaneous expectations of what might
come. I show that anticipation is further blurred, as our anticipatory horizons are
tied not only to our unsettled plotlines of becoming but also to our being’s existential
imperative.

An introduction

Theodore Powers and Theodoros Rakopoulos

This introduction posits that austerity is an instantiation of structural
adjustment programs (SAPs) and thus must be revisited in two ways, involving
its historical and geographical rendering. First, anthropological accounts should
think of austerity in the long term, providing encompassing genealogies of the
concept rather than seeing it as breach to historical continuity. Second, the discipline
should employ the comparative approach to bring together analyses of SAPs
in the Global South and austerity measures in the Global North, providing a more
comprehensive analysis of this phenomenon. We are interested in what austerity
does to people’s temporal consciousness, and what such people do toward a policy
process that impacts their lives. We find, in this comparative pursuit, instead of
Foucauldian internalization, dissent and dissatisfaction.

Beyond Reciprocity and Obligation in the Ger Districts of Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia

Elizabeth Fox

In the outskirts of Ulaanbaatar, known as ger districts, a growing number of rural-to-urban migrants live without access to formal urban infrastructure or regular
incomes. Under these challenging material conditions, personal networks take
precedence, providing and regulating access to employment and meat provisioning.
Looking beyond discussions of anticipation among migrants focusing on the goals
of migration, I interrogate the role of anticipation in the making and maintaining of
relational networks. Existing analyses of such networks in Mongolia have generally
relied on idioms of reciprocity or obligation. Focusing instead on material transfers
and transactions among ger district residents reveals such networks to be more
ambiguous and prone to failure than notions of reciprocity or obligation can easily
accommodate. This article argues that the productive contradiction within the
concept of anticipation – encompassing both expectative waiting and pre-emptive
action – can illuminate new aspects of these relations and networks in action.

Guy Lurie

This article unveils a virtually unknown chapter in the history
of judicial diversity in Israel. During its first 20 years of existence,
between 1948 and 1968, only three Arab judges were appointed. Then,
within two years, between 1968 and 1969, Israel appointed three additional
Arab judges. Two interconnected changes account for this small
increase in judicial diversity. First, in the 1960s, the Arab legal elite began
to exert pressure on Israeli officials to appoint Arab judges. Second, perhaps
partly due to this pressure, the Judicial Selection Committee made
having a diverse judiciary a top priority. This historical example teaches
us that without outside pressure, the Judicial Selection Committee does
not look on diversity as an important consideration, using the merit system
of appointment as an excuse for its failure. Indeed, up to the present
day, the Israeli judiciary has relatively few Arab judges.

Challenges, Obstacles, and Possibilities

Nohad ‘Ali and Rima’a Da’as

The notion of having an Arab university in the State of Israel
is exceedingly controversial, but also of great value and political and cultural
significance. Can such a dream become a reality in a state that defines
itself as Jewish, as well as democratic? This article discusses the vision of
establishing an Arab university, including the previous attempts to establish
one, the barriers and obstacles encountered, the reality of inequality
of academic rights, and how this dream might actually be brought to fruition.
The creation of an Arab university could represent an important step
in serving the needs of Israel’s Arab citizens, promoting their status in the
state, and protecting their identity, culture, and even existence.

Bongani Nyoka

This article attempts a preliminary discussion of the three
clusters of Archie Mafeje’s work. While Mafeje called for ‘non-disciplinarity’,
as against ‘interdisciplinarity’ or ‘disciplinarity’, this
article makes a case for why he should be read as a revolutionary sociologist.
In so doing, the article pieces together some of the key elements
of his oeuvre. The article consists of four main parts. The first part provides
some background and contextualises this article. The second part
deals with Mafeje’s programmatic critique of the discipline of anthropology
and other social sciences. The third part discusses his work on
land and agrarian issues in sub-Saharan Africa. The last section focuses
on his work on revolutionary theory and politics, with specific reference
to his assessment of the responsibility of the African intellectual.